Daytona is normally my favorite race.  Its close to home, all of my friends are there and I like the track style.  I have always done well and felt confident.  Its one of the tougher races of the year, with the sand and layout.  The track design was much longer this year than in recent years, similar to how it was when I started my pro career.  Carmichael had designed it and I knew he would make it rough and tumble.  The only wildcard that could ruin it was the weather...

     Practice was cut to only one session.  It had rained all night before the race and more rain was predicted for race time.  The track was actually pretty decent considering the amount of rain Thursday night.  It gave everyone a glimmer of hope that it would be a normal race.  I felt really good in practice, but only finishing 15th was kind of a bummer.  I watched the video and saw some slow spots, so I knew I could pick it up.  However, mother nature had other plans.  At about 3 o'clock the skies opened up.  It rained and rained and rained, destroying the track in the process.  There was so much standing water I didn't think the race was even possible.  I guess I was wrong.  They moved the program ahead an hour and away we went.
      I was in heat 1 and knew that a good start was going to be imperative.  I couldn't believe how bad the track looked in the Lites heats.  I was not looking forward to this.  I got a good jump off the line and got down to the first turn towards the front.  Unfortunately, I couldn't see anything.  When I say I couldn't see, I mean just that.  I got so much water splashed in my face I literally couldn't see 5 feet in front of me.  I was reaching for tearoffs but they were soaked and didn't do any good.  I struggled to get into the top 9 to qualify and saw I was 9th at one point.  Just after that Josh Hill came up behind me.  He decided that he would go ahead and knock me down on his way by... putting me way back in the pack.  Needless to say he has one coming.  It was everything I had to not go make a scene at his pit area but revenge is a meal  best served cold.  So, off to the LCQ I went.
     I started in the same gate as the heat race and once again came out decent.  I got ran a little wide in the first turn, letting a bunch of guys sneak up the inside.  I tried roll offs this time but that turned out to be a bad idea.  I made it about half a lap before they were useless.  I pulled my goggles off and immediately got splashed in the eyes with water and mud.  I rolled around the rest of the lap trying to get my eyes open.   I couldn't see where I was going and was about half a lap down so I pulled off.  It's something I never do but I had no choice and with only 3 laps in the LCQ, it was pointless to keep going.  I was really upset to not make the main event, and losing more points makes it that much worse.  It wasn't really a race at all and it's disappointing that so much is riding on an event that pathetic.  It worked out really well for a few guys so I'm sure they are happy the event ran.  Everyone else is probably wishing it hadn't gone.  Its water under the bridge now and everyone will move on to Minneapolis.  We still have quite a few races to go so hopefully I can make some points back on the guys who benefited from the mud mess.  I have some motivation now to get back up there so I guess every dark cloud has a silver lining.  I hope I'm much happier next week after Minneapolis!